FAMILY HONOUR [2]

"He let out a huge sigh and rubbed a trembling hand over his face. Then he realized Xian Mei was sitting in the kitchen doorway, staring at him. For a moment, he looked almost guilty, as if he had been caught doing something he shouldn't, then he walked across and knelt beside her. His damp jacket smelled of the city – of rain and petrol and dark places.

'You're going to have to be very brave and look after your mother, OK?' he said quietly.

Xian Mei looked up at him. His skin was saggy, and his eyes were red, and for the first time, she thought he looked old.

'Where's my father?' she asked.

Paul hesitated. 'You need to ask your mother that question.'

'Is he dead?' Xian Mei persisted.

Paul made a face as if he'd tasted something sour. Then he leaned forward and kissed Xian Mei gently on her forehead. 'I'll see you soon,' he said.

Xian Mei couldn't get her mother to speak to her. She tried, but Jiao had locked herself in the bathroom. She didn't emerge until grandmother Li arrived almost half an hour later. Even then the two women went into the bedroom, and Xian Mei was forced to wait outside. When they finally came out, both were pale and grim-faced. Jiao told Xian Mei that Li would look after her, then she went out without answering her daughter's questions.

'Why is Mother being so mean to me?' Xian Mei said.

Her grandmother shook her head wearily. 'She's not being mean. She's just upset. She's protecting you.'

'I don't need protecting,' Xian Mei said. 'I'm strong.'

Li smiled. 'Maybe you are.'

'I am,' Xian Mei insisted. She looked at her grandmother. 'Won't you tell me what's happened?'

Li averted her gaze. 'Maybe in the morning.'

'Now,' Xian Mei said. When her grandmother didn't reply, Xian Mei said almost defiantly, 'Father's dead, isn't he? Something happened to him tonight, and now he's dead.'

Li's eyes brimmed with tears, and she nodded. She wiped her face with a trembling hand. Eventually she said, 'He was very brave. He died a hero.'

It wasn't until the next day, or the day after that, that Xian Mei found out the full story. Her father had been killed in the line of duty, shot dead while trying to apprehend a gang of drug smugglers. It wasn't until he was gone that Xian Mei really discovered how loved and revered her father had been. In the days following his death, many people came to the house to pay their respects, and each of them had a story to tell about her father's courage, or humor, or kindness, or loyalty. As Xian Mei helped her mother prepare the house for his funeral – covering the statues of deities with red paper, removing the mirrors so the reflection of the coffin would not be glimpsed in the glass and bring bad luck, hanging the white cloth over the doorway, and placing a gong to the left of the entrance – she vowed she would honor her father's name by following in his footsteps.

It was a vow she neither forgot nor relinquished. For the next few years, driven by a steely determination and a single-mindedness she liked to think she had inherited directly from her father, she strove for excellence in all areas of her life. Always a good student, she now became an exceptional one, achieving the highest grades possible in every subject. But she knew that academia alone would not secure her a place in one of the toughest and most ruthlessly efficient police forces in the world, so she took up Changquan and trained tirelessly, day after day, pushing herself through physical barrier after physical barrier until she became one of the foremost martial artists for her age and gender, not only in China but in the world.

The day she was inducted into China's first all-female Special Forces squad was the greatest day of her life. Throughout the ceremony, as she stood there in her beautiful black and grey uniform, she thought only of her father and how proud he would be. Indeed, she strongly believed his spirit was there with her, standing at her shoulder, reveling in her success.

It took almost no time at all for the dream to turn into a nightmare. What became apparent to Xian Mei and her fellow inductees very quickly was that China's first all-female Special Forces squad was, in effect, little more than a glorified PR stunt. Xian Mei had had high hopes of becoming a pioneer, of helping to usher in a new age of equality in China, but almost as soon as the induction ceremony was over, the squad was broken up, and its members distributed around the globe on 'special assignments.' Xian Mei's assignment was to come here, to the Royal Palm Hotel in Banoi, and to spy on the decadent rich, using her receptionist's job as cover. What Xian Mei found particularly insulting was that her superiors didn't even bother to pretend she was doing vital work. It was abundantly clear to her that she had been shunted aside simply for the sake of convenience – a case of out of sight, out of mind. Although it was another gloriously sunny day in Banoi, Xian Mei felt her spirits plummeting as a bus pulled up outside the main doors, transporting the latest batch of holidaymakers from the airport. Although she planted a smile on her face, she wondered what her father would think if he could see her now. Would he be ashamed of his daughter or angry on her behalf? If the latter, she wished his spirit would give her some guidance on how to escape from this trap. Not only was she under strict orders to maintain a constant vigil and supply her superiors with weekly reports (reports in which she was finding it increasingly hard to say anything of value), but her government had paid for everything – her flights, her expenses – and she could not leave without their say-so. Even resigning from the Special Forces squad and flying home by scraping together her own meager savings was out of the question. She would be ostracized and labeled a trouble-maker, and it would bring great shame on her family. Despite the idyllic surroundings, therefore, in many ways, she felt just as much a prisoner as the rapists, murderers, and terrorists incarcerated in the high-security jail a couple of miles offshore.

The bus was disgorging its passengers now. As always, they looked bleary-eyed, sweaty, and flustered from all the traveling, but many of them were peering around with wonder and satisfaction. Xian Mei was not surprised. There was no denying Banoi was beautiful. It was a place of sunny skies, white sand, sparkling blue seas, palm trees, and flowers in abundance. For a tourist resort, the pace of life was laid-back, relaxed, and the atmosphere – even at night – was relatively peaceful. The soundtrack was one of insects, birds, and the sighing of the tide, rather than loud music, drunken shouting, and people throwing up.

The first of the holidaymakers were trudging into the hotel now, carrying their suitcases or dragging them on wheels behind them. They were pretty much the same as any other group of holidaymakers, as far as she could see, the majority of their number composed of families and couples. Banoi was a location that appealed to all age groups, which meant that in any sample selection of customers, you would find young honeymooning couples, middle-aged couples on a romantic break, and elderly couples hoping for a week or two of rest and gentle recreation. Xian Mei had been led to believe that westerners were conniving and deceitful, and so shamelessly decadent that they posed a serious threat to the world's very stability, but in the three months she had been here, she had seen little evidence of that. On the contrary, once you looked beyond their loud, revealing clothes and their open, sometimes abrasive manner, they were not that dissimilar to her own people. Unless Xian Mei was missing something, all they really seemed to want were healthy, happy, fulfilled lives for themselves and their families.

Occasionally, people would arrive here alone, and it was this group that Xian Mei observed most keenly. For the most part, though, they too seemed harmless, and in fact, she often ended up feeling sorry for them as they took their meals alone, or went for solitary walks along the beach, or spent their days sitting silently by the pool, their heads buried in a book. Sometimes she would strike up a conversation with one of them, find out they were a widow or a widower, or treating themselves to a quiet break after a painful divorce. Or sometimes they were single simply because they chose to be, content with their own company.

As ever with a batch of new arrivals, the first hour was a flurry of activity. Xian Mei and her three colleagues, who were often interchangeable depending on their shift patterns, tried to get through the check-in procedure as quickly and efficiently as possible. They all knew there was nothing more annoying for customers who had spent the whole day traveling, and who were desperate to freshen up and relax, than having to wait in yet another queue. But however efficiently she worked, she knew it was inevitable that one or two people out of a group of fifty or sixty would give her a hard time. In this case, it was a young, muscular, tattooed man with a flushed face and a slight limp. He thumped his elbows on the desk and leaned in towards her with a leer. Xian Mei tried not to recoil at the smell of alcohol on his breath."